


We'll figure it out together

by cactusthespacecat



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Any suggestions for plance and I'll do it plz there's not enough content, F/M, Fluff and Angst, Fluff and Humor, Honestly this was going to go a different way but here we are, I Will Go Down With This Ship, I Wrote This Instead of Sleeping, Other, Plance Day 2017, Plance being plance, Tooth-Rotting Fluff, Wow, bonding over insecurities, pidgance, plance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-09-10
Updated: 2017-09-10
Packaged: 2018-12-26 05:27:20
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,017
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12052275
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cactusthespacecat/pseuds/cactusthespacecat
Summary: Pidge is struggling with her worth on the team after Lotor goes missing and no one can find him, and Lance empathizes and it's very cute.





	We'll figure it out together

**Author's Note:**

> Give me a Plance prompt and I'll do it! This prompt was one I got from @mechantlee on Tumblr thanks for the idea!

Pidge tapped at the keyboard furiously, checking and cross-checking the limited facial recognition that she could get a hold of. 

Everyone else had gone to bed hours ago. Even Lance, after trying to help her, had been reduced to deafening yawns. And despite him trying to help, Lance had always distracted Pidge in a weird way. But now, the castle itself seems to breathe the heavy breaths of dazed sleep. 

The long white hair seemed to still be moving in that still frame, the pointed teeth glinting, framed by a smirk. All that the Paladins of Voltron had seen of Lotor in months was in front of her, and she still couldn’t find him.

Pidge felt like screaming. Nothing that she was trying would help, and she was starting to think that Lotor had actually found a way to a different reality. 

But, she told herself, the universe is ginormous. And what if she presented that idea to the team and they found him the next day? She would look like an idiot. 

The time of night and the fact that she couldn’t get anywhere with Lotor’s location was getting to Pidge, and she could tell. But she kept typing, ringing up groggy contact after yawning old friend and trying as hard as she could not to scream. 

I never thought that I would miss Zarkon, Pidge thought bitterly.

But her eyes were drooping slowly. It had to have been at least 13 hours of vigorously working and going nowhere, and she was exhausted. Pidge yawned so hard that she thought she might burst, but couldn’t stop. Every new thing she found seemed to lead directly to Lotor, but always ended up dragging her farther away. 

Pidge dropped asleep for a second and jumped awake dozens of times before her body wouldn’t let her anymore, and she slumped over on the couch, laptop still running hot, falling into a fitful sleep. 

 

In his room, Lance was sitting up, drowsy but still conscious.

He could have swore he heard Blue’s voice in his head, but he was terrified to get up in case he was making it up.

After a moment of Blue’s consistent calmness in his mind, he swallowed back the stressful feeling and got up, sliding into his blue slippers so that he didn’t make as much noise padding along the castle corridors. 

Lance wished that this was the first time that he had gone to the lion hangar hoping to talk to Blue about what was going on, but it certainly was not. 

But without fail, Blue stopped talking when he got close, and he started to wonder whether she was trying to talk to Allura and he was just over hearing. 

No one really had any idea how the lions worked, after all. Not even Pidge. 

Just as Lance thought that, he rounded the corner to pass the main control area and saw Pidge herself, lying curled up on the couch, sleeping. “Come on, girl.” He mumbled, smiling, “You know better than that.” 

Lance wandered over to the couch, not really knowing what he was doing. But his heart stopped when he got to the back of the couch. 

Pidge was sobbing. Ugly, wracking sobbing punctuated by gasps that made Lance freeze in terror, or anger, or maybe sympathy. 

Vividly, Lance remembered staying up with his niece and nephew and helping them through nightmares. And he hoped beyond hope that this would work. 

Lance sat next to Pidge’s head and pried her laptop from her fingers, trying to move as slowly as physically possible. Pidge moaned softly, full of pain, “Lance…” Lance nearly jumped.

“What?” He mumbled, both knowing that she was fast asleep and couldn’t know that he was here, but also longing that she tell him why she said his name. 

Lance was frozen. He didn’t know how to feel. Were Pidge’s nightmares about him? Would him being here make them worse?

But he couldn’t leave. Not with Pidge like this, sweat running down her forehead and all of her muscles tensed, tears staining the sleeves of her shirt.

Lance did what felt most natural at that moment other than running away. Running a hand through Pidge’s hair and slowly pulling her head into his lap.

They stayed there for a moment, Lance’s chest tight from stress and sympathy. Pidge’s sobs hiccupped to soft whimpers and Lance heard her speak again. “-can’t do it.” 

Lance took a deep breath, biting his tongue. Comforting his niece and nephew never felt like this. He knew that if he couldn’t help them, if he couldn’t calm them down before waking them up, their parents could. This was so much more stressful, so much important. And Pidge, well, Pidge meant something different to him. 

Lance swallowed, studying Pidge’s face in the soft blue nightlight of the castle. She really is beautiful, he thought, smiling. 

He almost laughed thinking about what Pidge would say if he told her that. She’d probably laugh at him, or maybe kick his shin. 

“Aliens are so much easier to understand than people.” Lance murmured out loud, without really meaning to. 

And to Lance’s terror, Pidge, her chest still heaving and her eyes still closed, smiled. “I prefer robots, personally.”

Lance tried to wiggle out from underneath Pidge’s head, hoping that she hadn’t noticed. 

“Lance?” Pidge said. “Am I on your lap?”

Lance froze, but Pidge didn’t seem upset, so he laughed. “Yeah,” he said, “You weren’t sleeping well, so I was trying to help you how I- used to help my niece and nephew when they had nightmares.” 

Pidge made a ‘huh’ sound. “You’re an uncle?” She sat up to look him in the eyes, but the sweat and tears combined with Lance’s petting had made it stick straight up. Lance snickered.

“What?” Pidge said, confused. 

But Lance couldn’t respond. His snicker had turned into a giggle, and evolved from that to a laugh, and then to a guffaw. 

Maybe it was the lack of good sleep, but Pidge’s hair sticking straight up in all directions was the funniest thing that Lance had seen in space.

Pidge put one hand up, and immediately felt what was going on. She giggled. “How did that-?”

Lance had devolved into the silent laughter stage, tears pricking his eyes. 

Pidge laughed even harder. “Shut up, Lance! Not everyone can be as perfect as you all the time!” 

It took a second for Lance to realize what Pidge had said, and when he did, he calmed down a bit to watch Pidge laugh. She laughed with her whole body, doubling up and hugging herself. And when she smiled, it split her face in two. It was hard to imagine that minutes before she had been sobbing in her sleep.

The thought made Lance worried again, but he waited until Pidge stopped laughing. “Hey, are you okay?” He asked. “You seemed pretty freaked out in your sleep.”

Pidge looked at Lance through an after-laughter buzz, and at first could not remember what she had been upset about. 

Then it hit her, fresh and hot. Lotor. Her face fell. “I’m just worried about Lotor, you know?” 

Lance smiled the way you smile when you’re trying to get someone else to smile, but Pidge wasn’t looking at him. “Look, Pidge, we’re gonna be alright. We’ve got Voltron! The most powerful thing in the universe, or something like that.”

Pidge smiled. “Something like that.” She looked up from her hands to Lance and tried not to get distracted with the way that he tilted his head just slightly, like a dog, or the tiny crease in between his eyebrows. “But what if that’s not enough? It’s been ten thousand years, and thanks to me, we can’t even find Lotor to fight him even if we could win, which, statistically, we can’t.”

Lance scooted closer to Pidge, now facing her cross-legged on the couch, “Hey, hey, hey, hey,” he said, eyebrows furrowing even more. “What do you mean, thanks to you? You’ve been working yourself to death over this,” He gestured to the laptop now lying on the floor, closed. 

Pidge grimaced, her jaw set. “But it’s not enough. I have one job, and I can’t do it. I’m not doing enough, but I don’t know how to give more.”

“Pidge-” 

“Lance, not to be cliche, but you wouldn’t get it.” 

Lance slumped in his cross legged position across from Pidge. “Is that because I don’t have a job?”

He didn’t mean to sound accusing, but Pidge looked startled. “What? No, I meant-”

“No, I’m sorry, I know what you meant, I thi-”

“Do you know what I mean ‘cause I don-”

“I mean if you mean what I think you-”

This kept going for another minute at least, the two of them trying to both talk and let the other talk, with the two getting progressively more blushy and flushed. 

When they were no longer completing words, Pidge stopped, taking a breath, and, in a moment of instinct, grabbed both of Lance’s hand and held them. “Lance.” 

“Yeah?” Lance said, very distracted by his held hands. 

“You talk and then I’ll talk, but not before you’re done.” 

“I can do that.” Lance said, grinning, holding Pidge’s hands a little tighter, and taking a deep breath. 

And he did. 

“Look, I know I’ve got a thing. It’s either being a funny guy or a ladies man,” He looked at his hands and blushed, but Pidge seemed unbothered, “Or being a sharpshooter. I really want be a sharpshooter. I’m not a bad shot, my bayard is a gun, you know?” Pidge nodded and shrugged. “But I feel like because no one sees me as a sharpshooter, you guys don’t need me as much as we need, say, Hunk, he’s an awesome mechanic AND a great chef.” Pidge grinned, but then got serious as Lance lowered his voice, his hands getting limp in hers, “So what if you guys don’t need me, you know?” Pidge opened her mouth to defend Lance from himself, but remembered the rule she set for herself, and set her jaw. “But I wouldn’t still be here if I didn’t contribute, right? And Blue has been calling for me, but always stops before I get to her, and I know that Red doesn’t hate me but I’m honestly still scared of her, because what if I’m just temporary and she’ll shut me out just like Blue did and I’ll be all alone because nobody really needs me and-”

Pidge did keep her word, but in an effort to stop Lance from making himself feel worse, she ripped a hand from his and put it over his mouth. 

She had thought about kissing him, but figured this was safer. She was wrong. Lance, without hesitation, bit Pidge’s hand so hard that Pidge started to scream. And realizing that and not wanting the other paladins to wake up, Lance lunged and put a hand over her mouth.

Pidge’s younger sibling instincts kicked in and she found herself biting Lance’s hand. Writhing in pain, with the other’s hands over their mouths, and limbs only vaguely indistinguishable from each other, Lance looked at Pidge from a vantage point an inch from her face. 

Pidge squinted up at him, trying to look put his face into focus. Lance grinned at her, but his cheeks were bright red. There was a long moment, and Lance sat back, taking his hand off of Pidge’s mouth and putting it softly on the side of her face. 

 

“You’re really great, you know that?” Lance said, and Pidge grinned.

“You’re pretty okay yourself, Lancey Lance.” 

Lance laughed a little bit, but his eyes were starting to droop. The whole ordeal had taken more out of him than he had thought. But he wanted to stay awake to make sure that Pidge was okay and to take her to her room when she fell asleep.

But before he could really say anything else, Pidge’s hands were stroking his hair and Lance was asleep, tangled up with Pidge on the couch.


End file.
